When filing my auto insurance claim, who can I go to for repairs?
There are insurance companies that have a preferred list of repair shops. These repair shops’ main business is the vehicles that come from insurance companies thus policy holders get priority. This helps the insurance company save on costs of rental or service vehicles. However, in majority of the cases, you do not have to go to any repair shop on any preferred list. You can inform the insurance company that you would rather choose your own repair shop. If you decide to do this, the insurance company usually requests you to submit more than one quotation for repairs.

This means shopping around for repair shop quotations. You can request for reimbursement of shopping for estimates. It is more tedious especially if you don’t have a ready list of repair shops but it gives the car owner the advantage of knowing the job will be done right. Many policy holders of expensive or classic cars would rather go through this inconvenience rather than entrust their car to someone they don’t know.
If the estimate or quotation exceeds the insurance limit, you will have to cover the difference. This is to deter insurance fraud which happens when an estimate is bloated to absorb the cost of the deductible or to make money off an insurance claim.